Assessing the political fallout on CEE from Brexit

There are already signs that the UK’s vote to leave the EU is emboldening populist and anti-EU sentiment in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). Given that the region is a major beneficiary from the EU’s budget, the economic incentives suggest a departure from the bloc is less likely than elsewhere. But the region would be threatened in the event of a broader fragmentation of the Union centred on Western Europe. All of this underlines a point we have made for some time that the key is to watch the political rather than the economic fallout from Brexit.